Viñas patrimoniales y vinos naturales de Chile: el legado mestizo gótico-mapuche

Abstract

This article examines the mestizo-Gothic-Mapuche legacy in the development and persistence of Chile's heritage vineyards and the production of natural wines, mainly the persistence of the 15,000 hectares of heritage vineyards that managed to stay alive in Chile during the 20th century despite pressure from industry and technocrats, who questioned the traditional ways of cultivating vines because of their low economic profitability. In the persistence of mestizo winegrowers in their traditional vineyards, elements of the Mapuche worldview and the tradition of Christianity, incorporated by the Spaniards during the colonial period, can be detected. A parallel is also detected between the stigma that Renaissance art historians formulated against Gothic art, and the account of the technocrats of the wine industry against traditional vineyards. It finds that heritage vineyards are underpinned by profound values, similar to those Goethe found in Gothic cathedrals, despite the ideology of the time. Finally, the article recommends to the State of Chile to nominate heritage vineyards to UNESCO, and to reserve the use of Christian and Mapuche symbols for natural wines instead of industrial wines.

Wineries in the Itata and Cauquenes Valleys: Local flavors, multiple dispossessions and care for the commons as pluriverses for (neo)peasant climate resilience

“…Producing with these characteristics required larger technological investment, which fell beyond peasant winemakers' means (Tapia, 2015). With this new entrepreneurial and technical-scientific outlook, the quality of traditional vineyards was cast into doubt with pejorative narratives about its methods (Jerkovic et al, 2022).…”

“…Knowledge. The knowledge underpinning winemaking constitutes old intergenerational know-how (Jerkovic et al, 2022) which has maintained winemaking as an agricultural mode adapted to precarious dryland conditions (Díaz, 2020;Pszczolkowski et al, 2021). This traditional knowledge has been intermixed with modern technologies and knowledge, which drive and revalue its socio-productive process without losing its territorial essence.…”

“…This drove the importation of French grape varietals, the hiring of French enologists, and the use of foreign production techniques for “modern wine.” There was increasing “ disdain for the other wine, the one there was before ” (Tapia, 2015: 21), the untutored and curled grapes, processed with tubs, shaking sifters, leather, and bare feet (Tapia, 2015). Condescending narratives arose against traditional, artisanal vineyards (Jerkovic et al, 2022). However, peasant wineries continued to be valued as a source of wine which was socially integrated and popularly distributed, and continued to be the main source of national consumption until the late 20th century (Lacoste, 2021), despite a lack of resources, marketing, or access to technical assistance (Vergara, 2019).…”

“…Wineries also have a cultural value for their heritage, from which the peasants have built a subject attachment. In this way, they become the guardians of heritage winemaking in Chile against industrialization and Gallicization (Jerkovic et al, 2021). This attachment transforms into territorial subjectivities which the wineries care for, and which form part of the local identities that have historically been forged in these valleys (Lacoste, 2021; Tapia, 2015).…”